I didn’t know which of these was best so I went with all of them. Background based on Mr. Gaiman’s fantastic jacket designed by Kambriel. Anyway, lovely bit of advice, really take it to heart.
Speaking of the last post. More good reminders. =)
Posts tagged advice
thesanityclause:I didn’t know which of these was best so I…
The Old Republic and more musings
So I’m sitting here rendering some Space Marine footage for the I-lost-count’th time and remembered I should write something here.
I’ve been playing Star Wars the Old Republic a fair bit since the christmas weekend and my little smuggler has reached level 33 so far.
It’s pretty much World of Warcraft in space gameplay wise, but there are enough differences to keep me interested. The classic Bioware writing is one of them, the class stories that I’ve seen so far have been well written and nicely laid out. The whole Taris part is very sentimental and interesting for me as I’ve played Knights of the Old Republic (some interesting things happening on that planet). The space combat is, while currently slightly repetitive, interesting and has a nice flow to it and the pvp is (to me) a lot more interesting than for example WoW.
I still miss the huge roleplayer support that Star Wars Galaxies had when it came out but to date that’s the only game that’s even come close to having that amount of animated (and actually useful) emotes and the only game where you have been able to have a purely social experience.
Anyhow, I decided that I should revive my old SWG character Erin Eevia, the Zabrak musician, as a smuggler and I set about it as soon as I could. Thus far I’m enjoying it most of the time, though the Scoundrel advanced class plays a lot different then I anticipated for a smuggler. I’m still trying to figure out what skill tree to go for though so everything’s still very much changing for my playstyle at the moment.
And right now I only have one big pet peeve and that’s the targeting. It’s really hard to heal for me due to targeting and as with just about every other game I’ve played that includes tab targeting, the tab targeting is horribad. It may just be that I need to get used to it or it will be changed slightly over time to make it easier. On my wish list right now is the ability to toggle on something similar to WoW’s enemy bars, basically small health bars above their heads to make targeting slightly easier.
But all in all, my experience so far has been very positive. There are a few bugs here and there, especially in some cut scenes (and twilek lekku drive me crazy with their twitching) and the textures tend to randomly swap between the high and low res ones. Still, bugs are to be expected at launch and so far they’re fairly few and non-critical as far as I’ve seen. I’m also quite happy about the fact that even if I get the urge to play, it’s not overshadowing everything else the way I had with WoW for the longest time, and speaking of I haven’t even played WoW for the weeks I’ve been poking around in SWTOR. So it’s a good enough experience that I want to spend time on it, but I don’t feel the pressure to constantly play to keep up. So, I think I’m going to keep spending time on this game, but in moderate enough amounts that I will be able to keep up all my other hobbies as well. =)
On a completely different note, I stumbled over an article while browsing twitter, 30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself, which is a good reminder of things I’m trying to live by this year. It’s so easy to forget to take care of yourself that I need a reminder as often as possible.
And, as I decided that this year will be my “heart on my sleeve” year, I personally need to work with not running away or avoiding my problems, stop lying to myself, stop trying to be someone else, stop being scared of making mistakes and berating myself for old ones, stop being idle, stop competing with everyone else, stop complaining/whining about the little things, stop acting like everything’s fine when it isn’t (see stop lying to myself) and stop focusing on what I don’t want to happen. Generally, I need to work with everything on that list, but those in particular. I have a very bad habit of being constantly afraid of making mistakes, afraid that others will think I’m weird and lying to myself that everything’s alright even when I feel completely crap. Time to work on fixing those habits!
I might do what my mom has been doing for a while which is every day you write down five good things that has happened and keep those in a journal. I might put them on here as I’m terrible at keeping actual physical journals, but we’ll see. I might even go back to trying to put together a small diary comic again, but we’ll see how that fares.
Anyhow, I need to get a few things done before work so I’ll stop poking around here for now. Hopefully I’ll write again tomorrow, provided I have anything interesting to show/tell. =)
Privilieges and entitlement
I just read Kotaku’s article “Frustrated Battlefield Rep Unloads on Ungrateful Community” and it touches on something I’ve been thinking about since MMO’s started to become really popular (basically since slightly before WoW came out).
A lot of gamers seem to have quite interesting views on what they are entitled to, especially within the MMO community but it’s bleeding over into most genres lately. And, having studied game development, this irks me. A lot. This ties into my artist side as well, but I’ll try to weave this all into a coherent post so bear with me.
Basically, it comes down to people misjudging the value of the service provided. When it comes to beta testing people miss the big point;it’s a testing phase and the developers could (generally) just as easily have drafted friends and family to test for them. Instead they’re letting their fans in on the action early in exchange for their help with bug reports and other general feedback. What the fans themselves seem to miss is their part of this bargain. They’re there to test the game, not necessarily to play it for fun, and they feel entitled to an as full fledged game as possible, tailored to their tastes. Which is not what beta is for as stated above.
Then there’s the common whine on MMO forums, especially on the WoW forums, that “omg I’m paying, give me what I want!” and “omg I’m paying, fix this shit!”. Basically, what you as a gamer is paying for is the server upkeep, the CR (customer relations) people (game masters, tech support etc), and the developer team. These people are not there for you personally, they’re there to see to it that the game runs as smoothly as it can and generally they know much better than you as a gamer what needs to be done. And don’t whine at the developers, they’re working their ass off delivering new content that will please as many as possible and won’t break the rest of the game. And they’ve got to keep up with bug reports and try to figure out why things happen, what triggers it and try to fix it without breaking anything with the fix. Coding is harder than a lot of people seem to think.
And don’t hate on the poor CR either, because they are simply the messengers. They can generally help you with smaller things, but if a game master or a tech support says they can’t help you for one reason or another then they can’t help you. Simple as that. Learn to graciously take a no for a no and move on. If for some reason tech or other CR people make a mistake, point it out to them in a kind manner, ranting and throwing tantrums won’t help and you’ll only stress people who are already stressed to start with. Treat them nicely and they’re more likely to relax enough to not make stress related mistakes.
It’s really amazing how people misjudge the amount of time and effort that goes into any artistic activity, be it game development, drawing, sculpting etc. In art the argument generally is “I don’t have to pay for this, anyone can draw so you should feel honored I picked you!”, with games it’s “make the game the way I want it ffs!”. People need to start realising that it’s with art as it is with any other service provided, you get what you pay for. If you enter an open beta, don’t go whine about how your favorite map isn’t in there or that your favorite class isn’t available. Developers chose what they put into beta because that’s what they need to test, or if they have one stable part and want to test the unstable features around it they’re not going to swap their stable map for an unstable one because the community demands it.
And with drawing/sculpting/painting, don’t you dare approach a working artist (and by working I mean anyone offering commissions as well as the industry professionals) with promises of “exposure” or your everlasting gratitude. “Exposure” and gratitude doesn’t pay for food on the table. And stop the whole non-paying thing, if you ask for a commission make sure you can pay for it because after all, you’re buying a service.
All in all I guess it comes down to common sense, and while common sense really isn’t common anymore we can still work to make it common again. Just treat people kindly and think before you type. =)
reports from the land of orange: Discouraging
reports from the land of orange: Discouraging:
drawology:Yesss… My grand total of two jobs I’ve ever had, I’ve gotten through friends. And to be honest, the one I do have now may not sound like much, but it really is an awesome job. Also, while I’m very much the quiet, shy type and I do have trouble keeping in touch with people, it does help A LOT to get out there, be nice to people and just keep in contact. Network, network, network. No matter what field you’re in. =)I keep hearing all these people complaining about people being out of jobs on television and its no fucking wonder when the job finding process is completely convoluted. Sure every now and then its simple, you go into a store, ask for an application, fill it out and then they…On the contrary, this realization shouldn’t be discouraging at all! Perhaps you’re looking at it the wrong way. You’ve come to realize something that a lot of people never do. This is an excellent understanding and now that you know it, you can apply it and use it to your favour! This knowledge is now a new tool in your career fetching arsenal—so use it effectively! Love it or hate it, this is the real world! Get out there, and get to know people.
You’re absolutely correct that the guy doing the hiring has countless job applications/resumes piling up on his desk, and that he will never actually get to see a good number of them. The ones he does look at, he’ll probably look at in a very non-committal manner. Unless, as you said, someone who’s already in the company fired off a recommendation. And you can’t blame them! No one will know who to hire more than this guy, but for this guy, looking at resumes is an extra curricular activity after completing the hefty, immediate and more demanding workload on his plate.
It literally takes one person who’s already in the company—to recommend you for hire, and suddenly your chances of being hired are up 50%*. The person who recommends you could literally be the janitor. It doesn’t matter. Someone, who is not you, who can approach the bossguy face to face and amiciabley mention, “Hey, this person I know submitted their resume for the ___ position! You should really check them out, they are fantastic!” that’s all it takes for you to win favour over the mountain of other applicants. Now the bossguy will, at the very least, look at your resume and do so considerately.
This is not discouraging. This is a useful thing to know! A very useful thing to know!
No matter what your profession, there are three people related things you must have. Not should—must. They are:
Friends in your industry: The more the merrier, but actually, you’ll need less of these and more of the other two. You can pick and chose these ones, obviously. They will be very useful for finding job opportunities, but will probably not be your most valuable industry resource.
Acquaintances: Do not discriminate with acquaintances! Become acquainted to as many people as you can, on friendly terms! Make sure they know what you do, and that you’re looking for work. Acquaintances will likely be the most probable people to say, “hey I know you’re a _____ and I thought I’d just let you know that a new position opened up at my workplace! Send your resume and I’ll put a good word in for you!”
Contacts: These are the people both your industry friends and your acquaintances will drop on you. When you’re given the name of a new contact, fire them an email! Tell them who you are, what you do, and who told you about them. Ask them questions if you want. If you’re respectable and put a professional, competent tone to your email, they’re not going to feel offended that you wanted to contact them. You don’t even have to see them in person, just let them know you exist and make them aware of what you do for a living.
Of course, having a good technical skills in your area of professional expertise outside of the interpersonal/PR skill set is also very important! It’s likely that you’re not the only person who’ll be recommended to the bossguy, so it does become important that you show yourself the be the more competent, more desirable employee. Your resume/portfolio/cover letter will do this for you, if you know what you’re doing well enough to have those speak for you :]
Welcome to the real world, don’t be discouraged—get out there and get the upper hand! Punch business in the face and go meet people!
*bullshit statistic.
